Viscountess St Davids taken to court over 'debts’

Viscountess St Davids, the wife of Viscount St Davids, known as Rhodri
Philipps, is alleged to owe almost £750,000 in unpaid loans.

Viscount St Davids, known as Rhodri Philipps, is married to Sarah Butcher.

Tim Walker. Edited by Sally Newall

7:30AM GMT 17 Nov 2011

Viscountess St Davids, whose husband was declared bankrupt earlier this year — for the second time in his life — is now being pursued in the courts herself.

Lady St Davids, better known as the interior decorator Sarah Butcher, is the subject of a High Court writ that claims she owes almost £750,000.

According to the writ, a first repayment of £200,000 to the Seychelles-based company Optional Systems should have been made by the end of October last year. Despite a written demand the following month, it has not been paid.

The loans were made at the request of Lady St Davids or her husband, the writ says. Viscount St Davids, a polo-playing friend of the model Jodie Kidd, was declared bankrupt in March. The aristocrat, 45, known as Rhodri Philipps before he inherited the viscountcy in 2009, said he was appealing against a two-year suspended sentence imposed upon him in Germany in 2008 after the collapse of his engineering firm Hans Brochier. He spent more than a year in prison while claims that he used company funds — more than £350,000 on promoting an opera singer, £12,000 to rent a private jet and £5,000 on a shotgun from James Purdey — were investigated.

Last year, a 10-bedroom property in West Sussex, worth £3.6 million, that was home to the couple was repossessed.